


Yours, Sadie Adler.

by galadrieljones



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Camaraderie, Coping, Epilogue, F/M, Friendship/Love, Grief/Mourning, Love, Moving On, Past Relationship(s), Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-31
Updated: 2019-05-31
Packaged: 2020-03-26 17:55:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19010905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/galadrieljones/pseuds/galadrieljones
Summary: Eight years after the fall, Sadie Adler is very good at hiding her pain. But her relationship with Arthur was more complicated than anybody knew, and without him, deep inside, she still struggles every day to reconstruct the pieces of her puzzled heart. So when John shows up, out of the blue, with a relic from their shared history, Sadie finds herself reliving the past, facing the hard realization that she does not have to suffer alone.





	Yours, Sadie Adler.

Sometimes Sadie Adler looks back, but not often. When she is making her home in a good town. Blackwater. Valentine. She knows the bartenders who rent her rooms on a discount tab. They make good conversation. She smokes and plays solitaire or else she folds paper into delicate animal shapes like her mother used to show her. Once, many years ago, she went down to Flat Iron Lake with Arthur, as she had complained of being bored and so he took her out fishing. This was right around the time they were camped at Clemens Point. She put her feet up on a log while he stood out by the water with his rod and reel. She folded up a little elephant and then a polar bear. When he came over to see what she was up to he was taken with the paper animals. The level of detail very much impressed him. She let him have them both and would make many more in the coming months and sometimes surprise him when they were out riding or robbing or shooting or other such unsavory enterprise. The little animals always made him smile, and he was good to her. She thought smiling is something he deserved. 

John is back in town.

He comes to meet her in Valentine. They visit for a while at the saloon bar, drinking warm whiskey out of glass cups. He looks older but in a handsome way, the way some men get with age. He has filled out and seems adult in the manner that he is full of problems in the world: his marriage, his property, his money. Abigail has left him, apparently, and she took the boy, and he is in a somber way. She’s never seen him so stressed. 

And yet John wears his stress in a simple manner. He seems to meet it like a challenge. He does not let it consume him. He is full of eternal youth, she thinks. 

“I found Arthur’s old journal the other day,” he says after a little while. This is a surprise. John is wearing an old pair of fingerless gloves that she thinks she recognizes. He is turning a quarter between his fingers. She wonders how much of Arthur is left behind now, in John, and then she looks away. “Couldn’t bring myself to open it for...years.”

“So, did you?” says Sadie, peering down into her glass. 

"Did I what?"

"Finally open it?"

“Not yet,” says John. “But I might.”

He sighs. She drinks. Somewhere in the back of the bar, a scuffle breaks out. They both glance, disinterested, only in momentary fashion.

“Don’t you think it’s...disrespectful?” he says eventually. He is pensive.

She thought they were there to talk about bounties. “What do you mean?” she says.

“I mean, reading a man’s private thoughts. Arthur never meant nobody to see what he wrote, I reckon. He kept his journal a secret his whole life. Even when we was younger.”

“He ain’t here no more,” says Sadie, shrugging. She throws back the remainder of her whiskey. She gestures to the bartender for a refill. “Anyway, he left it to you.”

John nods his head, defeated. He pockets the quarter. “Still feels...wrong."

Sadie says nothing. She taps her fingers on the table. 

 

* * *

 

Sadie and John go along and get one of the bounties the very next week. Having John along makes it a lot easier, she thinks. For as brash as she is, there is nothing quite like a trusty van der Linde gun to help speed things up in a pinch. But John is grittier than Arthur, she thinks. With the gun, on the job. Arthur was more like a surgeon. He operated with such technical skill and proficiency. He never made mistakes, was the cleanest, quickest, most accurate and intelligent gunslinger she ever knew. But this meant that jobs with Arthur could take a long time. He liked to plan. He liked things to be just right. Meanwhile, John is somewhat explosive in his demeanor if pressed to the brink. He tries to make plans but when he does this she can see it is like him wearing his big brother's clothes. It is unnatural. Meanwhile, he'll kick your jaw clean off in a temperamental fit if you rile him up enough. She thinks he must still have some unresolved anger inside him that ain't yet simmered.

"You seem rusty," says Sadie on the ride back to Blackwater. "What you been up to these past eight years?"

John sighs. He seems exasperated. "Odds and ends," says John. "I don't know. Worked on a ranch for a long time. I can't seem to keep my hands clean."

"Is that why Abigail left you?" says Sadie.

John gets quiet, but there is little darkness there. Everything with John is right on top, right on the surface, real bright. "Guess so," he says. "I don't know what she wants me to do. She wants me to...live straight. Live a quiet life. But I don't see how that's possible. I still got a price on my head. People want to see me hang. It's hard to live a...quiet life when there's always something."

Sadie laughs, real calm. "I hear that."

“Anyway,” says John after a little while as they ride. They're trotting side by side, straight into the dusk. "I, uh, I finally did it. I wanted to tell you."

"Did what?"

"I opened Arthur's journal."

Sadie lights a cigarette. "And?"

“And,” says John, “I’ve been reading it, a little, steady every night. It...calms me. I thought it would make me feel guilty but it’s like having him back in a way. It’s been so long, you know? It’s like--it’s like I pushed that whole day so far down, I almost couldn’t feel it no more.” 

“Ain’t that what you’d prefer,” says Sadie, flicking the cigarette. When the bounty on the back of her horse starts to bicker, she puts his lights out with the blunt end of her pistol. “Not feeling it no more?”

“I thought so,” says John, scratching at his overgrown beard. “For a long time. But now I don’t know. Maybe I was wrong.”

Sadie nods. She has little to say. 

"You wanna see it?" says John. "It's okay. You guys was friends."

"No," says Sadie without delay. "That's okay, John. You hang onto it and...well, it's yours now."

They get back to Beecher’s Hope together in the early night. There are coyotes and cougars screaming in the distance, but she's tired. She will not set foot inside.

“Come on,” says John, elated. “You should come in. We got food, whiskey. There’s a bed for you. Or, it’s more like a pile of blankets on a bunch of hay, but it beats the cold, hard ground.”

“Not tonight,” says Sadie. She hustles up her pretty horse and smiles. “Give Charles my best though, and old Uncle.”

John sighs, salutes her. "Well, we'll be in touch."

"Sounds good." She tips her hat, says she’ll see to it his funds get straight to the bank. As she rides away, she thinks that she sensed in him a boyish kind of disappointment upon her departure. Maybe he wanted to talk more, about the old days. He seems the sort. For a moment, it warms her heart, but then it’s gone. She rides.

Usually, Sadie would make camp or go back to her rented room in Blackwater. But tonight, she doesn't feel like stopping. She rides to Valentine, getting in in the very early morning hours. She realizes she wants to be somewhere familiar, but she has a hard time articulating this to herself. She goes to the saloon where the hall is mostly empty, but the bartender is a veritable night owl. He is still wide awake and serving the passers-through. She orders a bottle of gin, which she intends to share with him. Sometimes, she prefers conversation with strangers, as she can make things up as she goes along. The bartender is friendly, as usual. His name is Earl, but this all turns out to be a bad idea in the end. She is unable to stomach the company and finds herself being short with him in ways she will later regret. The bartender though, he is simple in his soul and takes it upon himself to compliment her hat. 

“What’s that lining you got in there, Miss Sadie?” he says. “You know, I never noticed that before. I never seen a hat with such a delicate lining as that. Is it French?"

Sadie scoffs and pushes off the bar. “Ain’t no  _miss_ ,” she says. “It’s missus, remember? And the lining of my hat ain’t none of your business.” She gives him a sly look, but it is all an act. He finds her to be humorous, another reason why she likes this place. She then says thank you and rides out of town and camps in that old spot of theirs--Horseshoe Overlook. She has almost forgotten what it was like, but she remembers the trail like it's yesterday. She’s not sure why she’s doing this to herself all of a sudden. She thinks about John and his aimless, boyish sadness and how he seems so alone without Abigail, and yet, he doesn't let it consume him. She sits down to remove her hat. She builds a fire and her tent. She sharpens her knife on a whetstone and cooks up a rabbit. The sound of the meat on the spit quiets her brain for a while. When she is full, she moves on to the bottle of gin. She puts the hat back on and leans against an old tree stump. She feels wistful.

 

* * *

 

“I feel like a boarded up window, Arthur,” she said one day, in St. Denis. Eight years before. Arthur had been up in Wapiti for a while, doing god knows what, but now he had returned and he was full of weariness. He didn’t have much to say about it. They were meeting because she wanted to ask him if he would ride with her to Hanging Dog Ranch. She didn't want to go alone, and there was nobody else she trusted. Nobody else she wanted. They were sitting at a table, by the window, in the saloon. Arthur had not really touched his whiskey. It was late at night.

"How do you mean?" said Arthur.

“I mean, I can’t see nothing in front of me but dark no more. It's maddening.”

Arthur sighed. He clearly had something hidden deep inside of him that she knew was there but she could not see. Tragedy here, tragedy there. Just dustings along the lining of his sad heart. “You’re just grieving,” he said eventually, real straight with her, as he always was.

"I can't still be grieving," she said, full of impatience and heat. "It's been months."

“I know how that goes," said Arthur. "And truth be told, months ain't nothing, Mrs. Adler. It can be years before...anyway, I know it don’t mean nothing right now, but give it time. You’ll see the daylight again.”

He drank, finally. He smiled. He was filled with wisdom, she thought. Always. And yet he had grown so defeated. She wondered how it was he had gotten to this place.

“Will you ride with me?” she said after a little while, sensing something was wrong. Really wrong with him. She placed her hand on his. He seemed a little surprised by her touch. He looked at their hands, touching, as if it were all a foreign entity, but he did not pull away.

"I will," he said.

He hesitated after this, seeming tired, but then he placed his other hand on top of hers. His hands felt like canvas, she still remembers. Worked too hard. Stretched and scraped. 

 

* * *

 

She decides to stick around New Hanover for a couple more weeks, chasing a curious lead on an outlaw fitting the rank description of Micah Bell. She ends up at the fence in Emerald Station, who says he pulled a stage through on a sale from a man who mentioned running with an old van der Linde gun. She wouldn't have thought twice about this, except for the fact that, according to the fence, there was a dead body in the cabin when he bought it, a woman, stabbed up pretty bad. Stabbed women didn't sound like no van der Linde gun but for Micah Bell. 

The fence in Emerald Station is an old friend that Sadie has been relying on for some time. In the mood to visit that day after a bunch of riding alone, Sadie finds herself drinking with him out in the warm sun, sitting on folding chairs next to the cattle yard. They have never discussed her past before, preferring to stick to matters of enterprise, but that day, with mention of the old gang, he becomes sentimental.

"Hey," he says to her after a little while. "You ever hear from that one feller anymore, used to run with your kind? Another van der Linde. Name of Hosea Matthews."

"Hosea?" says Sadie. She smiles and shakes her head. She's slicing up a peach with her knife, eating it piece by piece. "Yeah, I knew Hosea. He's dead though. Been dead for...more than eight years."

"Oh, that's too bad," says the fence, sighing, looking down into his bottle. "He was a real good guy. And a fine thief. He brought a feller around her once, came back a lot with goods for selling, fine coaches. He wasn't much for conversation but seemed decent. He liked to camp in the hills around here. I remember once, he cleared a true-to-life escaped lion out the barn, armed with nothing but his wits and his shiny volcanic."

"A lion?" says Sadie. "What the hell are you on about, mister?"

"It's true!" says the fence, laughing. "Ask anyone. He's a legend around here. Big man. Light hair. Blue eyes. Was always carrying really beautiful guns. Engravings and such, fully customized. Real works of art. He took great care of them guns. I offered to buy a few of them on more than one occasion, but he wouldn't part. I can't remember his name though."

"Arthur Morgan," says Sadie. It is strange to hear him described like this, and he never told her about no lion. She finishes the peach. She is sucking on the pit. "The man you're describing, that's Arthur."

"Arthur," says the fence, reminiscing to himself. "Yes, that was it. Arthur. Whatever happened to Arthur?" 

Sadie sighs. She hocks the pit and takes a toothpick out from behind her ear to pick at the loose pulp in her teeth. "He got sick," she says.

"Sick?" says the fence. "What kind of sick?"

"Tuberculosis," says Sadie. She drops the toothpick, stares at the place where it sticks into the dirt. "He died, too. Not long after Hosea."

"Jesus," says the fence. He seems downtrodden by this. He takes a long drink from his flask. "Tuberculosis? Did any of the old van der Lindes survive? Besides you, of course."

"There's a few of us," says Sadie. "Here and there. Though I don't much consort no more with those unseemly in the sight of the law."

The fence waves this off as a joke. "Aw, shit on the law," he says. "Wasn't the law who cleared the damn Murfree Brood out the Roanoke Valley. Wasn't the law who got them vaccinations for the poor Indians up north. Shit on the law. Things is changed, sure. But the law don't do nothing worth remembering. You all, however...nah. I remember you." He drinks more, and then more. "Yeah, I remember."

Before long he tips over, sleeping in his chair. Sadie folds him up a little paper dragon and leaves it sitting on his knee before riding off into the sunset. On that paper dragon, she has written a note:

 _Thank you for the company,_  says the note.  _I will return in a few months, probably. Try not to die. Yours, Sadie Adler._

 

* * *

 

“Buy me a damn drink, Arthur,” she said, exhausted and all fucked up. “I deserve it.”

They were in the old farmhouse of Hanging Dog Ranch, in the dark. They were alone now, their hands and clothes covered proper with O'Driscoll blood. Arthur said that he would buy her ten drinks. "How's that?" She laughed in her sad way as he patted her on the shoulder. She didn't know what the hell she was anymore.

Before they rode away, he helped her clean up her face with a handkerchief from his pocket. He tucked the loose hair behind both her ears and smoothed her hair in the back. He even fixed up her braid. He had a tender touch for an outlaw, she thought. More tender than she could have realized. He gave her his jacket, and they burned hers in the pit out back. Death hung all around them, everywhere, like jungle vines. 

It was hard to tell at this point, what level of affection this all was between them. Somewhere between comrade and lover, she thought, and she didn’t know the difference anymore.

She didn’t much care. 

 

* * *

 

A long while back, right around when the gang got down to Shady Belle, Sadie finally got the guts to ride her horse back up to the old ranch in Ambarino. She went to try and salvage a few things that had not been lost to the fire, and to take communion with her grief. She told only Arthur what she was doing, and he thought it was a good idea. He offered to ride with her, but she wanted to be alone, and of this, he was always respectful. It was cold up there, but she was used to it, even still. She preferred it to the swamps and the disgusting heat of Lemoyne. The cold made her lungs feel clean and wide open. Among the salvage of the old house was Jake’s wardrobe. It was merely singed, and inside of it, she found many items of zero consequence, but importantly, she found his hat. It is the hat that she continues wearing today, but at the time, the lining had grown thin.  She wore it every day like a testament to her old life and sadness, but after a while, it became near on unwearable.

She showed Arthur, who advised she speak to Abigail. "She's real good with a needle and thread," he said. "She's mended my hats on more than one occasion."

Sadie did as he suggested. But nothing Abigail suggested would do. She then took it to a tailer, and a milliner in St. Denis. But nothing was right. Nothing was soft enough. She retired the hat for a long time, worried all of a sudden that she would lose it or that it would fall to pieces.

When she and Jake were married, it was in June, and she was twenty-four. It was the best night of her whole life. They had drunk beer and danced in the church. But at the end right before they went to sleep she got a bee sting. It was strange. Why was there that bee in the house? How had it got there? Did it fly in through the door after them, or through an open window during the day? There weren't many bees in Ambarino, even in summer, so this was a mystery. Jake removed the stinger for her with a little pair of tweezers and kissed the tender, swollen spot on the inside of her arm. She was hardened in many ways in life, but not to this. Not to him. They made love finally as husband and wife, and they slept in the bed well past sunrise.

She hoped for many years to become pregnant with his child, but it just wouldn't take.

After Arthur was gone, Sadie hid out for a couple weeks all alone, way up north in the Grizzlies. She rode back south to Butcher Creek at some point to see what she could make of the wreckage. This had become a pattern, she realized. Arthur’s tent was rumpled, but sort of like with Jake, he had left a hope chest behind, filled with his belongings. Among his belongings was an old white french dress shirt with a delicate collar. She recognized it, and it still smelled like him, a little. She folded it up and tucked it into her saddle bag and rode away like hell, leaving everything else behind. She rode out to Big Valley where it was she could be incredibly alone. When she got there, she set up her camp in a huge, vast and never-ending, breathing field of lavender. It was beautiful. It was not far from the ranch at Hanging Dog. She took out her needle and thread, and using tips given to her by Abigail, took Arthur’s old french dress shirt apart seam by seam and sewed it right into the lining of her hat. It worked. Finally she had found something soft enough. 

 

* * *

 

They rode a long way that night, after the massacre at Hanging Dog. They stopped in Valentine. She had a hard time admitting to herself that he looked unwell, and that he had for some time, ever since he’d got back to Lakay, but she could not yet find the courage to ask him what was wrong. He was turning a coin in his fingers in the saloon there, wearing fingerless gloves that were unique to him. They drank until they were soft, and they leaned against each other in a booth at the back of the bar.

"Arthur," she said after a little while, her brain filled with an old pain and a new sense of relief. 

"Yes, ma'am," he said. He took off his gloves, one by one.

"I know I ain't a lady of frills," she said. "I ain't mild."

"What are you talking about?"

"I was just wondering if..." She sat up to look at him. She did not finish her question. 

"What's wrong?" he said. He cared so genuinely about everything he touched.

She kissed him.

He was taken by surprise, but he kissed her back. 

The next morning, when she woke up they were in one of the saloon hotel rooms, upstairs. Arthur was already dressed, sitting in a chair across from the bed, writing in his journal.

"What are you writing?" she said, looking around for her hat. 

He was quiet when he saw her. He closed the journal. He seemed hesitant. "Sadie," he said. "We should...talk."

She huffed. "Don't you give me them puppy dog eyes, Arthur Morgan."

"Puppy dog eyes?"

She got out of bed. She buttoned up her shirt. She went right over to him and grabbed his face with her hands. "That was my choice, last night, just as much as it was yours. You hear?"

"You was vulnerable," he said, shaking his head. "I should've been mindful." 

"Well, you was vulnerable, too," she said. "And I don't regret it. It was what I wanted. Is it what you wanted?"

He blinked. He nodded. "Yes," he said. "It was."

She half-smiled. Half-smiles were about as good as it got with Sadie Adler. "Good," she said. She noticed the shirt he was wearing--a white, french dress shirt that she had never seen before. Its delicate nature balanced finely with his otherwise rugged demeanor. “New shirt?” she said.

He looked down at his sleeves as if he had forgotten what he was wearing. “Oh. Yes. I suppose it is.”

"It looks good," she said. 

He was pleased. "Thank you, Mrs. Adler."

"Please Arthur," she said, tugging him on the collar, "it's just Sadie."

 

* * *

 

They went on and on like that, in and out for months in the end. It was a whirlwind and a secret. Sadie cried herself to sleep some nights. 

The night before the last train, she asked him to ride with her to the coast of the Lanahechee, north of Van Horne, like a punctuation of all they’d been through. It was not a short ride. He was weary and did not ask many questions, and when they got there, he set up their camp in his rote but reliable fashion that made her feel safe. 

He didn’t cough a lot when he was with her, not really ever. If ever he did, he walked away. She had never asked him what it was that he suffered from so, but she had guessed by now. She thought she remembered Hosea having a similar affliction and wondered if that was where Arthur had caught it, or if it was something else. Again, she would not ask. For she had loved a man who was doomed without her knowing, and now she was loving a man who was doomed, and she knew it. She began to wonder if it was her. If she was cursed. If she was the reason. 

“I just needed to get away,” said Sadie when he asked what they were doing there. She tossed her cigarette into the fire. “I didn’t wanna come alone. I hope that’s okay.” 

He seemed surprised, but pleasantly so, like he always did when she just liked being with him, as if the prospect of anyone simply wanting to spend time with him were foreign. He took a drink of the gin and passed her the bottle. “Of course it’s okay,” he said. He smiled. "And I’m relieved. To be away from there. You know I am."

They looked out at the water. They sat together for a long time. The river was so big and wide you could not see to the other side. It felt like they were looking at the sea. There were fireflies everywhere. She felt like crying. She did not. He was strong beside her, his jaw set. It didn't matter how bad things got, he never complained.

Sometimes, Sadie Adler thought she might tip over in the wide, frustrating world. Even in sickness he held her up. He was like a pillar.

“I am truly grateful,” he said to her at some point, out of nowhere it seemed.

"For what?"

He took a deep breath. It all rattled around in his lungs and she closed her eyes. "You and me," he went on, "we're more ghosts than people. But as a ghost, I am mighty glad for your company, Mrs. Adler.”

This broke her, in the end. She set her head on his shoulder because it was the only thing left to do. “Thanks, Arthur,” she said. He put his heavy arm around her to shield her from the cold. “And it’s just Sadie. For the umpteenth time.”

He laughed, deep in his warm chest.

When she glanced up at him a little later, he had his eyes closed. He looked so tranquil, she thought, his chin pressed to the top of her head, like he was asleep. 

It was the last night they’d ever spend before the storm.

 

* * *

 

Now, tonight, camping out at Horseshoe Overlook, she gets very drunk and passes out in the chilly weeds. She dreams of guilt. She dreams of regret. She dreams of eating fresh berries under the wide, warm sun in St. Denis and of Arthur Morgan. Normally, Sadie would kick and scream her way through the pain. She might even take a swing. But just like with Jake, she is realizing that she is not so hard as she thought. She is not so hard, just alone.

When she wakes up, it is morning and she feels stupid, and she feels like hell. She puts on her hat, and she pens a letter to John, letting him know of some more bounties she has learned of in the greater region of New Austin, and the information she has gathered regarding Micah Bell. 

 _I’ll be riding back your way if you’re interested, in the coming weeks,_ she writes. _You can find me at the saloon in Blackwater if you so please. I rent a room upstairs, and I will be there most days._ _Yours, Sadie Adler._

She postmarks the letter in Valentine, and she goes back to the saloon for a quick bite to eat before heading out.

"Well if it ain't the missus with the gun," says Earl the bartender when she comes through the door. He is shining up a glass and smiling. "What can I pour for you today, my lady?"

 

* * *

 

In the meantime, John finishes reading Arthur’s journal. He stays up late many nights to do so. He grows rapt in the beauty on the pages. Everything Arthur wrote about, John recognizes to some extent, but the way that Arthur saw the world and funneled it through words and pictures--it is truly remarkable. The ending brings surprises that even John could not have foreseen. He tells Abigail all about it one night while they are lying in bed together. She seems pained but happy as she listens. Thinking about Arthur makes her sad.

“Did you know?” she says. "About the two of them?"

“No,” says John. “Arthur was so secretive. I had no idea.”

“Well you gotta show Sadie,” she says eventually. “Didn’t you say you got a letter from her the other day? Saying she'll be in Blackwater?”

“I did,” says John, scratching at the beard on his chin. “And you’re right. She should see this.”

Abigail kisses him, this man who she has chosen. Things aren’t perfect yet, but they’re trying. They are. She asks if she can see the journal then. He gives it over, and she holds it in her hands. It is heavier than it looks. When she opens it up to flip through the pages, a bunch of little paper animals fall out into her lap. They are delicate and fancy, she thinks, and they come in many colors and shapes.

"What are all these?" she says, sifting through them, delighted. "Little animals? They're wonderful. You ever seen Arthur make one of these?"

"No," says John. "But then again, there was a lot I didn't see. It seems like something he would do though."

Abigail asks if she can keep just one. "Of course," John says, putting his arm around her. "Take your pick."

She chooses the little cat with the long tail. She will keep it displayed on her piano, a keepsake.

 

* * *

 

Abigail is not happy about the bounties, but John goes anyway after meeting up with Sadie at the saloon. Together, they ride out to Tall Trees, handle the bounty, and then they ride right back to Rhodes. They run into some trouble, but for a couple of old van der Linde guns, it’s no big deal. 

When they are finished, they go to the saloon, which reminds them both of old times, bad and good. John is nervous. He gives Sadie the journal and tells her that he has finished it, read it front to back, and that she ought to do the same.

“I don’t think so,” she says, smoking and drinking and acting real tough. “But thanks for the offer."

John is nursing his whiskey. She drinks him under the table most of the time, and he is man enough to admit it. He sighs. “You might just...want to,” he says. “Or, just flip to the last entry. Just read the last entry. Please. For me. For Arthur. Just do it.”

She takes the journal, even as she seems reluctant to do so. She nods, and she promises she will read the last entry, but another time. They drink, and John makes sure to remind her that she is always welcome at Beecher’s Hope. Then he leaves, and Sadie is alone again.

Sadie stays in Rhodes for another two days, drinking and avoiding. In a fit of restlessness and sobriety one night, she gets on her horse, and she rides due south to the swamps where she feels endangered and full of electricity. She finds refuge at an old haunt. Shady Belle, which has been abandoned by all but the gators. She goes upstairs and she sits on a chair on the balcony. It is late. She remembers all the good times. She drinks a little gin and removes her hat. She does not think about how that hat is a composite of the two of them. She thinks she can almost hear Cain barking. She can hear little Jack Marston making his ruckus in the puddles. She takes out Arthur’s journal and thinks about how he was about as closed and tough as it is, with so much sadness and beauty and mystery hidden inside. She runs her thumb along the sturdy leather spine. She flips through the pages, finally. She finds all her old paper animals, which make her smile that he kept them, and she reads the occasional entry, sure, but mostly she finds herself lost in the drawings. She knew he had liked to sketch but he had never shown her. The familiar sights and sounds of the world as rendered by his hand in pencil overwhelm her. They make her feel like he is here, with her. Alive. Just like John said. When she feels one little piece of warmth unleash into her bitter heart, she becomes emboldened. She vibrates. She turns to the last entry, like John told her to do. She takes a sip of gin, and she reads. She is surprised by what she finds there. 

 

* * *

 

_My Dearest Sadie,_

_If you are reading this, that means that I am gone, and that John has done me a great favor. I do not have much time, but what little I do have, I will spend writing this, to you:_

_We may never spend another moment of peace together, Mrs. Adler. It is true. But please know that even though our circumstances meant it never could have worked out between us, and I am certainly a damn fool for even thinking I might be deserving of your love, I want you to know that if we had more time, I would try. I ain’t a good man, but you made me feel like one, for a little while._

_I will miss you and what poor, little iteration of time we have spent together these past months. I know that you get sad. I know that you have demons that you bottle up and you hide from me and everyone. I know that you are like me in a lot of ways, but I hope that you will remember that you do not have go through all of this alone. That is what you showed me, in the end._

_At this point, it goes without saying, but even in these final hours, I am yours, Sadie Adler. No woman ever really got me but you. Thank you._

_With Love,_

_Arthur Morgan_

 

* * *

 

Sadie Adler cries alone at Shady Belle. She is a haunted woman in a haunted house. Her whole world is ghosts. She thinks of Jake, and how after he was gone, she stopped feeling things for a long time. Then Arthur was there, and he was gone, and she stopped feeling things again. For a long time. She holds the journal to her chest as if she can feel its beating heart.

But she is feeling things now, the full brunt of her entire sad, burnt out existence driving straight into her chest as a harpoon. She cries until her lungs hurt in the swampy heart of Shady Belle. It is daylight when she is finally finished and the whole world is a jungle, mean and pretty. She carefully removes that last page from Arthur’s journal. She’s gotta let John have it back, because it is his now, but she just wants that last entry. She doesn't fold it into the shape of an animal. She folds it into a simple square. She puts it away. She mounts her horse then. She doesn't know what to do or where to go, but she decides to head back west, toward Beecher’s Hope, to see the only people left who truly know her. It has been such a long time, but she is not without love in this world. Cursed or not, she never was.

So, Sadie Adler puts on her hat in the early morning sun, and like she is always wont to do, she rides again.


End file.
